Kansas City Chiefs Free Agency: Where do we stand now?

Offensive Guard

The other glaring weakness on the KC roster after the initial wave of free agency is at offensive guard. As mentioned previously, the Chiefs lost Jeff Allen in free agency and then cut Ben Grubbs because of a failed physical. That leaves Kansas City with four in house candidates to fill their two starting guard spots.

Those players are Zach Fulton, Jah Reid, Laurent Duvernay-Tardif, and Paul Fanaika. In a perfect world, Zach Fulton would be the back up center, LDT would be the back up guard, Jah Reid would be KC’s swing tackle, Paul Fanaika wouldn’t make the team and the Chiefs would start two players at guard that are better than all four of their in house candidates.

That is probably not likely, but I think it is essential that KC adds another guard to the mix that can start games. I have no problem with any of the four players mentioned competing for and earning a starting guard spot, but none of them are good enough to be handed a starting position.

So who is out there that KC could add? Well Evan Mathis is available again but if the Chiefs weren’t willing to pay his asking price last year it seems unlikely that they would now. Another former Bronco Louis Vasquez is also available but as of writing this he’s visiting the Titans and might not be a great scheme fit for KC, Geoff Schwartz has been here before and might love playing with his brother but has missed 21 of 32 games since leaving KC a couple years ago, and Stefen Wisniewski could even be considered if he was willing to play guard.

In terms of the draft the Chiefs could conceivably land the top prospect at the position in the first round if they decided to take local prospect Cody Whitehair out of Kansas State. Some second round options include LSU’s Vadal Alexander, Stanford’s Joshua Garnett, and Arizona State’s Christian Westerman.

Next: Wrapping it up...